Gospel Reflections, For Sundays of the Year C: Luke
by Donal Neary SJ (Irish Messenger Publications, €7.99pb)
In the post-Easter call for reflection, which ought to affect all parts of our lives, Fr Donal Neary’s little book will be very relevant, as we still have a good part of Year C to run. Fr Neary has many years of pastoral experience in Dublin, an essential qualification of understanding just what parts of the Gospel message trouble people, and what parts can be made to live for them.
This book is aimed as an aid not to the homilist, but for the people in the pews. He speaks of it being grounded in “the living human experience” – just what is so often lacking in what we hear on Sunday. For instance his remarks on this week’s third Sunday of Easter on the act of the risen Jesus lighting a fire to make breakfast for the disciples recalls his own mother. Jesus, he remarks, set great store in cooking and eating together.
“In cooking for people love is active. A mother might count up sometimes how many meals she has cooked, and call them hours of love. This too is the mission and identity of Jesus.” So it seems the family that eats together stays together.
Listening to God
Joyce Hogget (Hodder & Stoughton, £9.99pb)
Any book which has survived for a generation as this one has, must have something to say to readers. Joyce Huggett’s message was summed up very well by one of her early critics: “There are many books about talking to God, but surprisingly few about listening to him, and this is one of the best you will find.”
This too is a book soaked in the values of family life, but also in the needs of the wider community. Many people will find in these pages many things which will be helpful to them. But the main message, not to talk all the time, but to become a good listener to those close to you, to others around you, and beyond that to God himself is one which many people will benefit from.
The Winding Road of Life
by Dermot Layden (Published by the author, available from letterbooks.ie €10.00pb)
Dermot Leyden has published this book to share the experience of his long and active life with a wider circle. Though he lives in Sligo, where he worked, he also worked abroad in Tanzania. The aim he says is to encourage reflection and balance as we confront those inevitable issues of daily life.
He has learnt a lot at what he calls “the university of life”, which can be a hard school for some. He also writes of our unimaginable potential for greatness. But though he emphasises religion and social activism as a part of that fulfilled life, he also urges his readers to engage with nature around us, with God’s creation.
A book that urges us to put the results of our reflection into action.